Soil Fertility and Manure Management—Lessons from the Knowledge, Attitudes, and Practices of Girinka Farmers in the District of Ngoma, Rwanda

Abstract

and Education of Kibungo (INATEK), Kibungo, RwandaGirinka-or the "one-cow per poor family" program-is currently promoted as a poverty reduction strategy in Rwanda. In this program, resource-poor farmers receive a dairy cow and develop various skills and assets to improve their livelihood. One potential benefit of the program is to improve soil fertility through the application of manure. A study was conducted in the Ngoma district of Rwanda to assess the effectiveness of manure usage and current levels of manure knowledge, attitudes, and practices among the program beneficiaries. Our results suggest that moreThe authors wish to thank all the Girinka farmers who generously accorded their time in this study; the mayor and vice mayor of Ngoma district for their sincere interest and administrative support in this research; all the veterinarians and agronomists at the district of Ngoma who provided timely assistance in fieldwork operations and logistics; and the survey team of students from INATEK who were instrumental in data collection. We gratefully acknowledge all the key informants from the Ministry of Agriculture and Animal Resources, the Rwanda Animal Resources Development Authority and the Institute of Policy Analysis and Research in Rwanda. Sincere appreciation goes to two anonymous reviewers for helpful comments on an earlier draft. than 90% of Girinka farmers are using manure, and farmers positively attributed increased crop yields and improved soil fertility to manure use. However, farmers were not consistently using recommended manure management practices, citing lack of manure handling and transporting tools, distance to fields, and poor construction of cow sheds as key limiting factors. Significant differences in manure management, access to information and extension services, and constraints hindering manure usage among male and female farmers were also identified in this study. We recommend stronger emphasis on beneficial manure management practices during the Girinka trainings and suggest several ways to improve the potential benefits of manure usage for Girinka farmers in this region of Rwanda.

Revisiting Rwanda’s agricultural intensification policy: benefits of embracing farmer heterogeneity and crop-livestock integration strategies

“…Most farmers also own some livestock: 47 percent keep cattle, 24 percent keep pigs, 53 percent keep goats and 45 percent keep chickens (GoR, 2011). Farm animal manure is used extensively in soil fertility management as it is one of the most important and often the sole input of fertiliser for smallholders in Rwanda (Kim et al, 2013). For instance, in agricultural season A in 2020, 1 while over 60 percent of farmers applied organic manure (63 by small-and 69 by large-scale farmers), 34 percent used chemical fertiliser with a considerably low application by smallholders (33 percent) than largescale farmers (84 percent) (GoR, 2020).…”

“…To keep an even size and distribution of the sub-groups, we stratified the next 40% as "middle" and the top 30% as "high" δ The mean size of land cultivated per household in the Rwamagana district (0.7 ha) is used as a reference threshold (GoR, 2011) λ The tropical livestock unit (TLU) conversion factors are: bull = 1.2; cow = 1.0; heifer = 0.78; male calf = 0.38; female calf = 0.43; pig = 0.3; sheep/goat = 0.2; chicken/rabbit = 0.04 (Njuki et al, 2011) φ The observations made are only from the most affluent sub-group members. Therefore, the variable perfectly determines the Low chemical fertiliser use makes farm animal manure an essential input for soil fertility and crop production (Kim et al, 2013). All farmers use farm animal manure to enrich the soil, but the most significant volume derives from cattle.…”

One cow per poor family: Effects on the growth of consumption and crop production

“…One potential obstacle in Rwanda is land fragmentation which hampers an efficient use of organic manure simply since it needs transportation between different plots. Through interviews with Girinka participants in Rwanda these long distances are brought up as a main challenge (Kim, Tiessen, Beeche, Mukankurunziza, & Kamatari, 2013). The implication is that households need both the knowledge of manure usage as well as means of transportation.…”

“…For the case of Girinka, there are some studies on the use of manure linked to the program. Results from household surveys show that more than 90% of the beneficiaries use manure and that this positively affects their productivity (Kim et al, 2013). The ability to use manure in an efficient way is very much related to knowledge and the ability to introduce new methods of tillage.…”

Women's perceptions of the Girinka (one cow per poor family) programme, poverty alleviation and climate resilience in Rwanda

“…When used in appropriate combinations, cow manure reduces the carbon footprint of chemical fertiliser manufacture and transportation. A further application with the cow sludge is its reported use as a natural pesticide, a practice that reduces the negative ecological impacts of pesticide use (Kim et al, 2013). The Girinka programme is therefore proving to be a significant adaptation strategy for climate resilience for nutritional and food security in Rwanda with more than 90% of Girinka farmers using green manure and reporting article Downloaded by [New York University] at 12:58 14 May 2015 increased crop yields and improved soil fertility (Kim et al, 2013;Send a Cow, 2008).…”